Connect
by oddishh
Summary: When they found him, there were so many broken pieces that the thought of the Winter Soldier ever being Bucky again seemed impossible. Time would tell.


Notes: The Winter Soldier ruined me. The comics themselves have always been in my Top 3, but this damn movie turned me into a sappy puddle of feels. This is me channeling those feels.

Major spoilers for Captain America: The Winter Soldier

**Connect**

They tracked him down four months after the helicarrier fell. There had been a call or two placed by Smithsonian staff regarding a strange man that had been visiting the Captain America exhibit almost daily. They were able to intercept the one. He was absolutely decrepit, sporting a tattered hoodie and jeans that he probably found in the trash.

For precautionary purposes, he was hit with a tranquilizer dart upon being found; Clint's quick precision and aim saw to that he didn't have time to fight back before he crumbled to the ground. Unsurprisingly, it was Steve who picked him up into his arms and laid him down in the back of the unmarked van. He was strapped down as another precaution, with Clint and Natasha there for back up in case he somehow managed to break free.

Stark Tower now worked as a base of operations for several members of the now disbanded SHIELD. While there were several locations, the tower served as one of the main central points. Though Tony downright refused at first, he couldn't say no for very long once the memories of his fellow Avengers came surfacing back. He still wanted absolutely no part in fighting, but did agree to help.

They hadn't taken over the entire tower, however. Tony made it so there were roughly four floors available to them, all on the lower floors so they were practically underground. It worked out nicely for everyone. Special elevators and passcodes were set up so only authorized persons could access those floors.

For the most part, however, the tower was a refuge for those right in the center of SHIELD's politics. Steve Rogers was practically homeless now, Natasha had nowhere to go, and Clint also needed a place to crash.

They kept The Winter Soldier on the lowest floor, strapped to a bed. Bruce was called in, along with two others that Tony trusted. Tony had insisted at helping remove the bionic arm, admiring the ingenuity whilst simultaneously picking it apart and declaring all the ways he could make it better. It was done for everyone's safety, as it was a powerful weapon in it's own right.

But by _god_ was that damn thing in there good. The metal extended down nearly to his ribcage and was hooked up to his nervous system, a series of wires and plates giving him control of it. The arm was practically melded into his _skin_. It took a grueling ten hours, but it was completely and safely removed by the time the sun was starting to set. The metal that was connected to his nervous system was still attached, however. No need to accidentally kill the guy.

For the first two days, the Soldier was kept knocked out until all the tests were completed and he was properly assessed. On four occasions he thrashed and panicked through some seriously terrifying nightmares. Steve almost never left his side, resisting the urge to try and calm him down when the nightmares hit him. Fury was there, surprise surprise, and advised Steve not to touch him, so as to not risk injury.

On the third day he woke up, but not before being injected with a mild sedative for necessary safety measures. Despite only being partially lucid, the Soldier was still obviously panicked and ready to strike at the first opportunity.

Steve and Natasha are in the room, the former because this man is his best friend in the entire world and the latter for both security and a private reason of her own.

"Where is it?" His voice was gruff and low from lack of use.

Nick was there as well, knowing immediately what he was referring to. "It was removed as a safety precaution."

"Execution?" he asked simply.

He shakes his head, "No, you're not being executed. You are in protective custody."

The Soldier was silent, looking broken and empty. His eyes were wide and had a twinge of fear in them. He lay there, waiting for Nick to continue. He would speak only when required, as his handlers always requested.

"What is your name, Soldier?" It's a simple question, but a good starting point.

He shakes his head, "I don't know."

Steve visibly tensed at the words, looking like he could break at any second. Natasha looks at him empathetically and gives his wrist a light squeeze. Nick was stone-faced and calm, pressing on. "What were you called by your handlers?"

"Soldier. Asset."

Nick nodded softly. "Why were you at the Smithsonian?"

"I needed to find out if the target was lying."

Steve tensed again upon hearing his former best friend refer to him that way. They had stripped his entire identity away. Seeing him so robotic and emotionless made him want to hunt down every last individual associated with Hydra and do what they had done to him.

Nick crossed his arms, "Was he lying?"

The Soldier looked over to Steve, locking him in an unflinching gaze.

"No."

...

A week-and-a-half went by, and during that timespan the Soldier was subjected to a battery of psychological tests, interviews regarding Hydra, and questions about his past. The tests shed light on a ton of things, as did the interviews. For better or worse, the pieces were falling into place.

"_In all the years I've done this, I've never seen a case of PTSD this bad. It's gonna be an uphill battle, and that's just sugarcoating it."_ Steve didn't find the words comforting, especially coming from someone like Sam who would know firsthand. He was one of the first people that had agreed to help find Bucky, and the closest thing Steve had to a friend right now.

What Sam said was the truth, though; no matter how much Steve didn't want it to be. Bucky had flashbacks at least a dozen times a day and couldn't sleep before waking up two hours later to the sounds of his own screams. He didn't know who he was, and when he wasn't experiencing a flashback, panic attack, or nightmare he was scarily numb. Saying he was a train wreck didn't even scratch the surface.

There was a sort of silver lining, however. There was still a tiny glimmer of hope. It was all to assure he wasn't being deceptive, the polygraph tests. He passed everything they threw at him with flying colors.

"_What are your plans?"_

"_To find the truth."_

"_What is the truth to you?"_

"_YA ne znayu."_

"_In English please."_

"_I don't know." It hardly seems to cross his thoughts that he switched back to Russian._

"_Do you still intend to complete your mission?"_

"_No."_

It was an unfathomable relief for Steve to know he no longer had the desire to assassinate him. No, that didn't even begin to describe it. It was an _extremely_ unfathomable relief.

During the course of those ten days, the Soldier had been slowly taken off the sedatives so as to not risk dependence. In only really bad episodes were any used. By the eighth day, he was off of them completely and it showed. There was much more anxiety and panic in his features, more tension in his shoulders, and an unwavering flash of guilt in his haunted blue-grey eyes.

So, yes, there was a silver lining.

...

Nick Fury surprised Steve with how sympathetic he was to his friend's situation. All the files they had recovered confirmed that he was psychologically, emotionally, and physically tortured until he did Hydra's bidding. His humanity and identity were stripped from him. He was an asset, a weapon to their cause.

They broke him.

The fall caused him amnesia along with the loss of his arm. They only started implementing the memory wipes when his brain began healing and he started to recover what he was. The first two assassinations apparently were followed by extreme remorse and regret from the Soldier.

The fact that he rescued Steve and had to be reconditioned before he was set out to kill him, due to the fact he was starting to remember, made Nick a bit more willing to give this man a chance.

But, Nick Fury was a realist as well. He made the decision that they would wait and see if he would ever be well enough to function again, even if it's just enough to get by. If not, they would be forced to take him out.

That, and Nick Fury always had secret motives behind his actions.

Steve was such a frequent visitor that Tony eventually joked that he should put an extra bed in there. Even though Steve was around a lot, he tried really hard to not push his former friend too much. He wanted to take it slow, as Natasha suggested.

There were very few words exchanged between the two at first, but eventually the Soldier began saying little things here and there. They seemed out of the blue to anyone else, but Steve picked up on them immediately.

The first occurrence was two weeks after he was brought in. Steve was telling him about how many different genres of music there were today compared to seventy years ago when he interrupted him.

"You liked drawing."

Steve blinked, shocked. "Yeah I do, Buck. Where did, where did that come from?"

"I saw it," he said flatly.

"Just now?"

He nods and Steve grins widely, fighting back the tears.

Over the next few weeks, he starts to remember little things before the Winter Soldier. Steve's sketches, their apartment, Steve being smaller, and cheerful days spent walking through town.

There were other memories too, but these ones were not as pleasant. Steve experiencing a severe asthma attack, him being strapped to a gurney, and agony from losing his arm. Those ones contributed to the panic attacks and episodes.

When weeks slowly became a month and more memories flooded back to the Soldier's broken mind, he suddenly recalls something. It's something really, really bad. He's inconsolable.

"Bucky, it's alright!" Steve yells as the Soldier paced the room, cell. His lone arm was wrapped around his torso and he was practically hyperventilating.

"No it isn't!" he shouted. He starts to mutter in Russian and sinks to the floor, rocking back and forth. Steve wasn't sure how to handle this himself, but he wanted to help him, somehow. He was just about to approach him when the door opened and closed behind him.

Natasha walked over to the man on the floor. She knelt down in front of him, completely unafraid, and shouted:

"_Posmotri na menya! Vy v bezopasnosti!"_

The Soldier looked at her in shock, as did Steve. The muttering stopped, but he still had his arm wrapped around himself.

He spoke, voice hoarse and full of anguish. _"Moy otryad popal v plen. Moya vina."_ Tears started to fall from his eyes. Then, something else hit him and his panic rose. Steve almost moved forward but Natasha stopped him with a hand.

"_YA pomnyu tebya seychas. YA chut' ne ubil tebya!"_

She shook her head and smiled a sad smile._ "Eto ne tvoya vina. Ne vinite sebya."_

"_Mne tak zhal'," _he cries, _"mne tak zhal'. Vy byli yeshche rebenkom."_

"_YA proshchayu tebya_," she says softly, seeming to be moved by his words.

It was the first time she had directly interacted with Bucky, but definitely not the last. There would be times later, during terrifying flashbacks or nightmares, where all he could speak and understand was Russian and she served as the perfect tool to calm him down. Steve knew Natasha's story, hell the whole world did at this point, but he was starting to wonder if she held even more secrets that not even the records told.

At the end of the second month, Tony returns Bucky his arm with Fury's permission. The star had been buffed out (a request placed by Bucky) and it had gotten some serious TLC. The functionality was significantly decreased, making it so Bucky could not use it as a weapon but he could still do basic tasks with it.

Tony said that if he did well enough, he's cool with him having free reign of the area Natasha, Clint, and Steve used. All he had to do was prove he wouldn't murder everyone in their sleep, and even with that he would be watched very carefully.

Three months go by and Bucky is doing 'well' enough to be put on probation.

...

He was given a room right next to Steve. It was a decent size with a simple design. The furnishings were pretty standard with a queen bed, chair, nightstand, dresser, and work desk with a light. There was no closet or television, but those were two things Bucky could live without.

Steve gave him a notebook to write down recovered memories in. There was still that small—kind of large—part of him that had the urge to finish the mission and report back to his handlers. At first there was no question that that's what he needed to do. He wasn't a person, after all. He was a ghost, a tool, and above all an asset.

It was too late to go back now. He knew the truth and with every passing day he felt the Winter Soldier losing his grip more and more. No, it wasn't that James Buchanan Barnes was actually returning. It had been too long; too much damage had been done. Instead, a seasoned and broken and battle-hardened man who once did everything to protect what he cared for and pushed himself way too hard as a result was forming. He would forever be the person known as James Barnes, but it was James Barnes that had changed for better or worse.

He's more than sure that with time, more traces of this man called Bucky will surface and hell, maybe in the end of it all he'll be an even better person than he was before.

Only time would tell.

As more weeks pass by, the numbness and the icy persona he had been forced to uphold for so long were wearing off. Dr. Banner was working on helping him recover memories. The Sam guy had said it's going to get a lot worse before it gets better. He was skeptical at his words, as yes, he was starting to feel a lot of guilt and yes the nightmares and flashbacks were kind of nasty but he would be just fine.

He should have listened to him more.

The nightmares and flashbacks got so much _worse_, extra worse as Banner helped him dig deeper into his brain and recover more lost memories. He developed several reactions to things that both Bruce and Sam called triggers and it was so bad that a stomp of the foot—courtesy of Clint squashing a bug on the floor—made him shatter a glass in his good hands and sink to the floor in panic and misery. His mind was in tatters as it tried to mend all the damage that had been done and sort out where certain memories belonged and he started to _hate _himself and loathe the man in the mirror _so much _that he punched it so it shattered everywhere.

He slowly started to realize that James Barnes was actually pretty self-hating, anyway. He put on such a strong front because he had to and he had to prove himself because he was a portrait of a fine young American man who had to serve his country and hold on to what little he had. That young man blamed himself for everything and he was so unsure of himself but he had to act together just like he had to prove himself because he had to be _strong_.

James Barnes charmed and James Barnes put on the cocky smile not because he was so sure of himself, but because he was just so damn _unsure_ of himself that he had to put on those stupid façades and he had to wear those stupid masks just to get himself through the day. Because deep down all he wanted was a shoulder to cry on for all the pain he felt and he wanted someone to shatter all the damn masks he wore but he wouldn't even let his _best friend in the entire world_ in enough to do that for him. Because he was Bucky Barnes and he had to be the strong one, not the one who leaned on people. He came from a military family, after all. It was instilled that he was a strapping young man, so therefore he had to hide all his sensitivity and all his tender and delicate feelings somewhere far back into he depths of his mind until he got so good at hiding his insecurities that nobody would notice that that was his true self.

_That_ was the real James Barnes. He was the man that only had one amazing friend to keep his head above water, even though Steve didn't realize how much his presence kept him going all those years ago.

He would never let him forget it, not now at least.

...

Five days out of the week, Steve would either be in Bucky's bed or slouched in the chair next to it. He refused to let Steve offer him support him the first two months, but as his hardened life as the Winter Soldier was melting into a human being, he started to become more accepting of his presence. He would wake up screaming or crying every night, and Steve was just a room away. He was so nonjudgmental when Bucky would sob for sometimes half an hour into his shoulder and cling to him like a child. He was a calming presence, unwaveringly persistent, as he would repeat to him over and over again that he was safe.

Bucky was making progress, though, especially by the time the half-year mark rolled around. Yeah, it was slow and often a step forward was two giant steps back but it was something. He was feeling genuinely human again, something that felt alien as all hell. He talked more, made more decisions for himself, and even laughed once or twice. So yes, he was making progress.

It wasn't enough to stop the nightmares or flashbacks or those triggers of his. Sure, the flashbacks had been reduced to a mere six times a day rather than a dozen and he only woke up to the sound of himself screaming five times a week rather than eleven, but he wished his mind could heal as fast as his physical self could. Bruce kept telling him to be patient and assured him things would get better, but there was James fucking Barnes again telling him he has to be stronger and that he has to put on more of those masks because he has to prove himself and not look so weak.

He's grown up enough now that he's shared this important information with Steve, and when he first heard what actually went on in the head of James Buchanan Barnes he didn't seemed shocked. He did live with him and grew up with him, after all, so he probably figured it out at some point and just accepted that he hid.

Now was different, however. Steve didn't accept it anymore. Anytime he saw Bucky shutting down and trying to put those fronts back up he would be there telling him to 'be straight with him' and assuring him that 'I won't judge you, just tell me the truth Buck'.

Seven months in, Bucky comes to a few bitter realizations. The first is that James Buchanan Barnes was dead. The second is that the Winter Soldier was dead. The third, and by far the scariest realization, was that the life for the new man he had become was just beginning.

...

It had been nearly nine months and things seemed to be going very well. Yeah, it seemed that way alright.

The first indication that there was still a long, long, long way to go for Bucky to get even close to getting better was in April when the first major rainstorm hit.

It was beating down on the tower mercilessly, making little rivers down the windowpanes. This in itself wasn't a bad thing. In fact, the rain was quite calming to Bucky. He sat on the couch in the living area, discussing the past with Steve. It was just the two of them. Natasha was in her room and Clint was out and about. Tony was busy with Stark Industry matters and said something about a boring business meeting.

Bucky is more than content as he, without any pushes from Steve, recalls a trip to Coney Island. Steve is starting to get rather animated as he recalls the memory when a huge thunderclap echoes through the tower, followed by a large bolt of lightning that flashes brilliantly into the room.

Bucky is upright and rigid in a flash, backing up into a wall in screaming in fear. He is holding his head, his flesh and blood hand digging into his right temple and leaving bloody gashes courtesy of his nails, while the metal hand is dragged down the other temple and leaving behind ugly bruises. He sobs loudly, begging to not be mind wiped as he sinks to the floor and continues to hyperventilate.

This was a particularly bad one, but Steve knows exactly what to do. He is kneeling in front of his best friend in an instant, his strong hands firmly grasping his wrists so he doesn't injure himself further. Natasha quickly exits her room, choosing to stand there as backup if things go south, letting Steve handle it for now. Steve shakes him lightly, telling him firmly but kindly that he's here with him and that he is safe. Bucky is still gasping for breath, eyes wide and bloodshot as he looks into Steve's serene gaze. He's trying to form words, trying to repeat the words Steve is saying to him over and over in a mantra, that he is safe and not back in Hydra's clutches.

Bucky will later come to recognize this as a powerful trigger. Then again, as Natasha calmly pointed out, you don't just get shocked with agonizing volts of electricity a countless number of times and _not _have a strong reaction to, well, electricity.

He eventually calms down enough for Steve to let go of his wrists and wrap his arms around him. Bucky tenses at first, but not a moment later he melts into the embrace and starts to sob again, clutching Steve's back like his life depended on it. Steve was calm, patient, and understanding. Bucky's mind is screaming to pull away and stop being so damn weak. He can't, though. He's too exhausted from grief and too tired of hiding. They remained that way for a good five minutes until Bucky's shoulders stopped shaking and his eyes went dry.

...

It had been three months since the thunderstorm incident and a full year since Steve found him. During the time lapse, Bucky had really worked hard on himself. He started reading up on PTSD and talking over his issues with Sam.

"I think, all honesty, in your case we aren't talking about recovery. We're talkin' about coping." Sam's face was serious and sympathetic.

Bucky knew he spoke the truth. Scans had been done on his brain and there was a lot going on up there that he may never be able to help. With how much he was shocked and put in cryo, Bruce said it was a fucking miracle he could function as well as he could. Because of his chemistry being so out of whack, his anxiety would probably always be high, but it was stabilized significantly with the medication he was taking. It was a day-by-day thing, with the good days gradually reaching a one-to-one ratio with the bad.

There was a big change when SHIELD—now at the very least a small resemblance of what it was—received intelligence regarding what was left of Hydra. Bucky, of course, supplied a novel of information as he recalled it. At this point, he had a separate notebook for Hydra and his time as the Winter Soldier.

In any other case, the shit hits the fan. Loads of crazy things happen and the entire Avengers crew is called into action.

They are gone for four whole days. Bucky is past livid; they were snuffing out what was left of Hydra and he wasn't even allowed to help.

It was high-risk for him to go out onto that battlefield, though. So, he understood why it was done. He still had this overwhelming sense to fight, to get revenge. He didn't want Steve to get revenge for him; he wanted to deliver it himself.

So, he sulked and remained in high anxiety mode the entire time. He was concerned for Steve and at this point the others. They'd kind of become his extended family, even Tony.

Keeping him company was Nick, Pepper, Thor's girlfriend Jane, and this brunette girl that hadn't really introduced herself to him. SHIELD was rebuilding slowly but surely and were able—with the help of Stark Industries—to pool their resources together and put up a good fight against Hydra. Most of the leads Bucky supplied them with paid off and it gave them a good upper hand.

Stark Tower itself was under extremely tight security. So far there were only two attempted attacks, but they were intercepted. Bucky actually helped stop both of them. Hydra knew he was there, but they knew he was out of their clutches for too long so trying to reprogram him would take way too much time and effort. When they figured out he wouldn't be fighting with the rest of SHIELD, they gave up on trying to kill him. They had more important matters to focus on.

So, as Bucky focused on all the things that were currently happening in the world, there was a loud booming noise. Brown-haired girl had the same overly startled reaction he had and whipped something out of her purse faster than he could process.

"Who's there?" she yelled. "I'll shock you right in your balls if you do anything! See, listen!" The brunette pressed down on a button on what Bucky figured out was a Taser.

The electrical buzzing was too much.

"Shut that thing off!" Pepper yelled, eyeing Bucky worriedly, aware of that trigger.

She did as she was told, sighing. Jane offered a small roll of the eyes. "Just a blown transformer."

"How can you tell?!" Taser girl demanded. "What if it's that alien prick dude?"

"It's not, I'm telling you right—"

The two continued to argue back and forth and Pepper looked to Bucky who was slowly backing away. Being the kindhearted person she was, she almost stepped forward to offer support but Nick stopped her. He was glad for this, as he would have rejected her help anyway.

Now weak in the knees and filled with a number of terrible memories flitting through his mind, he staggered off into the bathroom and vomited, spending an additional fifteen minutes dry heaving and gasping for breath.

He eventually joined the others, Nick studying him closely and Pepper still looking at him tensely. Bucky had to force himself to talk to her and assured her he handled it and he was okay. Taser girl offered an apology, which he waves off, followed by him whispering 'it's fine' and never making eye contact.

He spends the rest of the time in his room.

In the end, the Avengers saved the day and Hydra was completely brought down. They all lived happily-ever-after and rode unicorns on rainbows to pots of gold, right?

...

Bucky seriously had a lot to thank Sam Wilson for. The guy had to be one of the nicest, most compassionate men he had ever had the pleasure of meeting. He was so understanding and empathetic to his situation and he didn't seem to hold a grudge for his actions as the Winter Soldier. Bucky had to admit to himself that if he was being honest, Sam had every right to hate him after putting his wings out of commission temporarily and almost killing him.

Yeah, he could say 'it wasn't your fault' and 'you didn't know what you were doing' all he wanted, but he was still the person—the _thing_—that endangered his life.

But Sam Wilson is seriously a stand-up guy with a sharp wit that makes even Bucky as broken as he is crack a smile. He tells him to come to meetings with him now that Hydra is ancient history and he doesn't have to worry so much about a hit being placed on him.

He refused at first, and by at first he refused for the first four months after he initially asked him. Only when he started trusting more and started feeling more like he could fit into society like at least a semblance of a human being did he agree to go along with him and Steve.

Bucky _really_ had a lot to thank Sam for, but that's obvious by this point. The meetings did so much to help him, just for the sheer fact that he got words of encouragement and advice from people—granted, nowhere near as messed up as he was—that understood to an extent what he was going through. He learned about meditation, clearing his mind and such and that really did him a lot of good when it came to reducing the nightmares and flashbacks.

So, he sleeps a little easier now because he's finally growing up and learning how to reach out for people when he needs help. While they have decreased significantly, the nightmares and flashbacks and triggers are still all there, but looking at where he started out and how far he had come, Bucky thinks that maybe he can finally find something close to the word 'happy'.

...

Bucky meets the kooky Taser girl again when the hammer god comes to pay a visit. Thor is a fun guy, full of energy and warmth. And to be honest, Bucky needs people like that. They already took a liking to each other and hit it off pretty well, which was a really good thing because if Thor wanted his ass dead it would only take a moment.

But the Taser girl seemed to feel bad about setting him off last time, so she walks straight up to Bucky and says that Jane started getting some PTSD 'probs' and she understands it better now.

Never in a thousand, no, one million years did he think he would spend four hours talking to this woman. Taser girl was actually named Darcy and she had one of the most endearing and intriguing personalities he ever had the pleasure of coming across.

She was actually really, really pleasant towards him and started talking about how much she felt for him and how she is a little freaked out that she isn't scared of him, considering that he was once a brainwashed killing machine. She says she's been around so much of 'this crazy stuff' that she is much more open-minded as a result.

They have similar senses of humor and get each other's jokes. Steve watches them, a goofy grin on his face, and Bucky almost wants to flip him the bird.

She wrote her number on his real hand and she looked at him with pretty eyes, winking as she stood up and left with Jane and Thor.

He called her two days later.

...

Tony had been picked specifically to do the very important paintjob. Bucky clashed with the man a bit, but had a begrudging respect for him and his genius.

It started as a joke, courtesy of Tony, but turned into something serious.

"Since you two are in such a tangled bromance, you might as well just paint Captain Popsicle's shield where that Red Star of Death used to be," he said with a smirk after he found Steve and Bucky at the kitchen table. Steve had his hand over top of Bucky's flesh one after the latter experienced a rather gruesome flashback and Tony being Tony couldn't resist lightening the mood.

Naturally, he laughed it off at first, Bucky did. But over the next few days, he was all for getting it done. He was going to surprise Steve with it, to top it all off.

It took the mechanical genius no more than twenty minutes to finish it down to the last detail. Bucky thanks him, genuine as all hell.

Tony knows about Bucky all-too-well. Bucky feels so much remorse and guilt for his actions that his expression just screams it. He is often quite uncomfortable around this man for that reason. How could Tony Stark, son of people he _murdered_, be so forgiving, to the point that he's letting him stay in the tower?

Stark isn't dumb, though, not by any stretch of the imagination. So, he uses the same words he's heard from countless other people. Well, a version.

"It wasn't you. Just move on from it and don't make me feel like I kicked your damn dog."

Bucky can tell that Tony has a giant heart and compassion the size of Mount Everest. He can also tell that Tony isn't the type to talk things out seriously, favoring humor to cope with his issues. So, after taking in Tony's words, Bucky offers him an appreciative nod and walks back to his room.

When he finally is alone and gets a good look of it in the mirror, he lets a few tears fall.

After he composes himself, he finds Steve in his bedroom drawing away in his sketchpad. It doesn't take him long to notice Bucky in the doorway. He smiles, closes the pad, and tells him to "come on in".

"Had something I wanted to show you," Bucky says with a small smile. He walked slowly into the room and was glad Steve was at an angle that didn't allow him to see the new paintjob.

Steve sat up from his relaxed stance on the bed. "What?"

He walks forward until he is just a few feet away from Steve and turns so he can see the new art. He stares at it dumbfounded; mouth agape as he studied it like a very good book. "Did you just do this?" he asked shakily.

Bucky nodded, "Stark did it for me. We've been planning it for the past few days."

Something strong, something highly emotional seemed to hit Steve. He continued to stare at it, filled with a look of what Bucky took as guilt. He hadn't expected his reaction to be negative, not in any sense. He hadn't expected Steve to look so damn miserable.

"What's up?" he asked softly. "Don't like that I did it?"

He shook his head, swallowing a lump in his throat, "I, I don't deserve it."

Bucky looked him square in the face, "And what makes you think that?"

"I mean I don't deserve so much respect. Your… loyalty."

"You saved my life," he said seriously. "Why wouldn't I pay tribute?" Steve said nothing, but looked even sadder at the words. Bucky was prepared for whatever Steve was going to throw his way. "Talk to me, Steve."

He swallowed another lump in his throat, giving Bucky a small nod.

"It was always you watching out for me," he says painfully, voice laden with emotion. "Any time I found myself in a rough patch you were there. You were always there. And I… I let that happen to you. I could have prevented so much. I could have been the one to protect you." A tear slides down his cheek and he swallows before continuing. "As much as I can try to make up for it, I don't think I ever can. The last thing you should do is pay tribute to a coward like me, Buck."

A hand on his bicep shakes Steve out of his self-loathing. Bucky practically commands he meet his gaze. "That's enough," he says, quiet but firm. "You wouldn't have been able to know. How would you have? Even if you did come look for me, Hydra may have found me first anyway. _You_ saved me from that lab. _You_ have stopped at nothing to get me through this. I don't care what you say, because you _do_ deserve it."

Steve looks at him with a sad, glassy gaze. Bucky hates it so much that he does the only thing he can think of to make it go away. "C'mere, punk," he says softly before tightening his arms around him in an embrace. Steve reciprocates, trembling slightly as he grasps the material on Bucky's shirt.

Bucky is patient, as Steve had been so patient with him this past year-and-a-half. He cries silently in Bucky's embrace for a solid eight minutes and when the emotions have been properly dealt with, Bucky is wiping his own eyes.

He's just glad he can finally be the shoulder to lean on again.

...

Bucky often questioned his relationship with Steve. It was the 21st century and a much more accepting time. He had been talking a lot with Darcy lately, meeting up with her for coffee and such, when she brought something very interesting up. They were terms that didn't even yet exist in the 40s.

"I'm really into this love stuff," she had said with a laugh. "I took a course once that talked about different sexualities. Did you know that it's proven that, like, you can be in love with someone without actually wanting to sleep with them?"

He shook his head slowly, "Is that so?"

She nodded with a grin. "It's called platonic love. Even if it's with the same sex, it doesn't mean you're automatically gay. Sometimes it comes from very strong friendships and you can still be completely heterosexual even if you felt that way."

She looked at him with a laugh. She was losing him. "Okay, but yeah like I said before in other words it's being in love with someone without wanting to bang them." She noted that he restrained bursting out laughing at her phrasing. "I think you got it. Isn't that rad, though? I love this stuff."

Though he didn't tell her, he thought a lot on her words. For a good two weeks, he did some serious thinking about how he felt and examined all of his recovered memories of him and Steve and the depths of their friendship and how there is no way to even argue now that they are just best friends. Bucky was slowly coming to the conclusion that there was a lot more to their friendship than he thought possible.

After being much more reserved and withdrawn, an indication to everyone that he was in a down slope and probably just needed space, he decided to talk out his 'feels', as Darcy had called them, to Steve.

Steve was at the kitchen table drinking black coffee and reading a newspaper when Bucky sat down across from him and folded his hands in front of him, contemplating on how to go about this without sounding completely gay for his friend.

"Morning, Buck," Steve said with a smile and nod. "Want a section?" He gestured to the paper.

Bucky shook his head, "I'm okay." His hands were still clasped in front of him. Steve picked up on his tension.

"What's up?" he asked gently as he set the paper down, knowing it could be anything. He was more than conditioned to Bucky's vast array of issues by this point.

"Do you think we're really friends?" he asked bluntly, and immediately realized it sounded way different than he intended it to be.

Steve eyed him, his gaze soft and nonjudgmental. "Of course we are, Buck. We've been best friends for over eighty years. Nothing's gonna change that."

He laughed a small laugh, blue-grey eyes flashing. "I didn't mean it in that way, Steve." He took in a deep breath before continuing. "What I meant was, after all we've been through, do you think we're just friends? Do you think that close friends does enough to explain what we are?"

Steve sighed and Bucky took it as a good sign that he wasn't met with negativity. Instead, he grinned a little bit. "Well, I know I don't feel _that_ way about you, but I see your point. If the word love was brought up and I was forced to say the first name that came to mind, I would probably say yours."

"What about Peggy?" Bucky asked.

"She's a different kind of love, the more traditional kind," he says without hesitation, looking a bit bluer at the mention of her.

They left it at that. But after that conversation, it was obvious they had both come to terms with having a romantic friendship. Neither seemed ashamed.

...

In the end of it all, Bucky grows up. Three years after being found, he and Steve and Sam and Darcy move into a house together. He does covert missions under his codename, Winter Soldier, which he had come to finally accept as being part of him. But rather than keep it as a bad thing, he would turn it into something for good. He does some highly sensitive and classified work, but he's definitely working for the good guys now and the rebuilt and reformed SHIELD gives him a nice paycheck for his work.

Steve and Sam still work with the other Avengers, fighting whatever weird alien evil force thing comes their way. Bucky helped out a few times, but he was never very comfortable with being an official member. As with him, they also are given good pay.

Natasha is doing well, finally starting to bury the skeletons that were in her closet for so long. Clint is still occasionally haunted over being brainwashed, but for the most part he's happy with his life and where he is with it. Tony also has a few PTSD things that give him issues; luckily he has Pepper for when it gets really bad. Bruce will always have problems with his alter ego, but he's controlled and subdued enough to get by. Thor and Jane got married. Darcy was the Maid of Honor.

Darcy works as the assistant to Jane, who does some seriously awesome work for Stark Industries. It's not that much of a demanding job, at least not as demanding as Bucky's, but it pays for Netflix and ITunes and the Internet and her bills so Darcy is content.

Connecting the dots in his life and rebuilding himself from the bottom-up seemed impossible, but Bucky Barnes did it. Because he finally, for the first time in his life, reached out for help and let people in was he able to mend. Like damaged nerves or snapped buds, some wounds will never completely heal. The nightmares, the flashbacks, and the guilt will always remain. He will never be classified as normal. He will always, on sporadic occasions, find himself on the battlefield surrounded by innocents he killed. Most of the time it's Darcy and Steve who shake him out of it and offer comfort, but Sam and Natasha do it as well. Hell, he can do it himself most of the time. He only ever had to take off from a mission once so far.

Like everything else, there are good days and bad. He doesn't put too much thought into when things do get bad because that would just make him relapse back into where he was toward the beginning of his journey. Plus, those that understand his pain and know how to cheer him up and know how to help him get through it always make the bad days better.

It's a crisp Autumn day when Bucky finds himself relaxing on the couch, Darcy practically in his lap with her hand running through his long hair and the other caressing the deep scar tissue that connected his flesh to the metal arm. Steve is close by and it takes him a second to realize that he's sketching them. It's the most at peace he has felt in over seventy years.

Its days like these that he focuses not on the past and not on the future, but the now. At long last, he finally remembers what it feels like to be human.

This, he thought, is what it truly means to be alive.

**FIN**

...

**Endnotes:**

Thanks so much for reading, everyone! I hope you enjoyed it as much as I enjoyed writing it!

**Translations:**

"Posmotri na menya! Vy v bezopasnosti!" = "Look at me! You are safe!"

"Moy otryad popal v plen. Moya vina." = "My squad was captured. My fault."

"YA pomnyu tebya seychas. YA chut' ne ubil tebya!" = "I remember you now. I almost killed you!"

"Eto ne tvoya vina. Ne vinite sebya." = "It's not your fault. Don't blame yourself."

"Mne tak zhal', mne tak zhal'. Vy byli yeshche rebenkom." = "I'm so sorry, I'm so sorry. You were just a child."

"YA proshchayu tebya." = "I forgive you."


End file.
